Riveted seam.



G. B. PHILLIPS.

RIVETED SEAM.

APPLICATION FILED NOV. 11. 1916.

1,257,388. Patente Feb.26,1918.

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Specification of Letters Patent.

iatented Feb. 26, 1918.

Application filed November 11, 1916. Serial No. 130,746.

To all whom it may concern Be it known that I, GEORGE B. PHILLIPS, acitizen of the United States, and a resident of Lima, in the county ofAllen and State of Ohio, have invented certain new and usefulImprovements in Riveted Seams, of which the following is aspecification.

My invention relates to riveted seanis which are particularly useful inthe construction of shells for boilers or other cylindrical vessels orstructures subject to tensile strain.

In the ordinary lap joint heretofore used the straight overlapping plateends are riveted together by rows of rivets parallel with the plate endsand at right angles to the direction of tensile strain. Owing to therivet holes the seam is very much weakened and the efficiency in verylow. Attempts have been made to increase the eihciency by applyingstraight inner and outer butt straps or liners over the abutting ends ofthe plates but also in this construction the cificiency is very low.Vauclain in his Patent No. 701,777, June 3, 1902, shows improvedarrangement which produces a joint having a very high eiiiciency but todo this he uses a large diamond shaped inner plate, and an outercovering strip and rivets this strip and the inner plate and theabutting ends of the boiler plates together by rivet rows parallel tothe abuttin line, and he rivets the inner plates along their diagonaledges to the boiler plate bodies. This produces a joint which isweakened only by the rivet holes at the corners of the inner plates, butthe seam requires extra metal in the form of the inner plate and theouter strip, and innumerable rivets.

In other prior structures devised to increase the e'fliciency the endsof boiler plates are out to toothed or Zigzag form and the plate endsoverlapped with the diagonal sides of the teeth in parallelism and theoverlapping sections riveted together by rivet rows parallel with thetoothed sides. This form of scam likewise lacks in eiiiciency.

The object of my invention is to produce without the use of extra inneror outer plates and with a minimum number of rivets a seam which isweakened only to the extent of a single rivet hole and of very nearlyone hundred per cent. eiiiciency, and I accomplish this by cutting awaythe corners of shell or boiler plates to leave diagonal edges whichconverge to each. other, and then overlapping the plate ends andriveting theinto the plate body by rivets in rows parallel to thediagonal edges to thus form a rectangular or diamond shaped seam, therebeing only one rivet at the apex of each overlapping end so that thesection of the seam at such rivet will be weakened only by the holefor-the rivet, and at any line inside of this one rivet the loss inmetal occasioned by the rivet holes will be more than compensated for bythe shearing strength of the rivet or rivets outside of the line.

I have shown one form of my improved seam on the accompanying drawing,in which Figure 1 is a side elevational view of part of a boiler showingplate ends secured together by my improved seam to form the sections andthe sections riveted together end to end in telescopic engagement.

Fig. 2 is an end view of the boiler, and

3 is an enlarged view showing the for iation of the seam.

In Fig. 1 the boiler sections B may each be formed by bending andseaming together the ends of a single plate or by seaming togetherseveral plates. If a single plate is used, as shown, its ends a and Z)have their corners cut away to leave the diagonal edges 0, (Z and e, frespectively, the edges coming together to apexes g and h at the centrallongitudinal line of the plate. The ends a and Z) are then overlappedand rigidly secured to the plate body by rows of rivets 2' runningparallel with the diagonal edges, there being only one rivet j at theapex g and only one rivet 70 at the apex it, the resulting seam being ofrectangular or diamond shape. To hold the plate ends in contact at thecenter of the earn and also to assist in strengthening the joint, rivetsm may be provided, and if desired rivets a may be placed at intervalsinside of and in staggered relation to the rivets 2'. After formationor" the boiler sections B by seaming plate ends together the sectionsare secured together end to end to form the boiler or other container,as indicated in Fig. 1.

With my improved seam 1 eflect a great saving of material as the plateends are riveted directly together without the use of special inside oroutside reinforcing plates. Furthermore, as all the material for theseam is carried in the plate there is a great saving of time and laborin handling. There is also considerable saving in amount of rivets usedas no rivet passes through more than two thicknesses of plate.Furthermore, the seam is of maximum eficiency'as the plate can beweakened only by the loss of a single rivet hole. This in the ordinaryboiler plate of four foot width would give a seam efiiciency of close to99%. The weakest section of the seam would be at the lines passinthrough the apex rivets j and is. At any a other section within the apexrivets the loss in strength caused by the rivet holes would be more thancompensated for by the shearing strength of the rivets outside of suchsection and therefore the efliciency at any section within the apexrivets would be greater than 100%, that is, the strength is greater thanthat of the plate outside of the scam.

In locomotive work it is often necessary to have an additional thicknessof metal at some particular point in the circumference of the boiler andto accomplish this it has been the usual practice to apply a reinforcingplate or plates, but with my improved overlap joint, a joint can be solocated that the double thickness will come where the extra material isrequired and thus a saving of boiler material and labor results.

I do not desire to be limited to the exact shape and arrangement of scamshown as changes and modifications are no doubt possible which wouldstill come within the scope of the appended claims.

I claim as follows:

1. In a boiler section, a seam comprising plate ends extending fullwidth of the section and having their outer corners cut away diagonallyalong straight lines and overlapped to form a diamond-shaped joint, andrivets passing through said ends and equally spaced along the straightdiagonal edges whereby the distances between the transverse linespassing through opposite rivet holes will be equal to thereby prevent afracture along one transverse line from including one or more rivetholes of an adjacent transverse line.

2. In a boiler section, a seam comprising overlapping plate endsextending full width of the section and having their corners cut away toleave diagonal convergent edges, and rivets applied through said endsalong said diagonal edges, there being only one rivet at each apex ofthe converging edges and said rivet being sufliciently displaced fromthe transverse line passing through the next preceding rivets that afracture line will not include the holes of such rivets and the hole ofthe apex rivet.

In witness whereof I hereunto subscribe my name this 8th day ofNovember, A. D. 1916.

GEORGE B. PHILLIPS.

Copies of this patent may be obtained for five cents each, by addressingthe (lc-mmissioner of ratents,

Washington, D. 0.

